Northrop Grumman Corporation has donated $5,000
toward construction of a memorial to the Navy submarine USS Thresher
(SSN 593) in memory of two employees who perished when the Thresher sank in the Atlantic Ocean 50 years ago.
Northrop Grumman Sperry Marine employees Kenneth R. Corcoran and Donald T. Stadtmuller
were performing work on the Thresher's gyroscope when the submarine
sank during deep-diving tests approximately 200 miles off New England in
April 1963. All 129 military crewmen and civilian technicians onboard perished.
Prior
to his employment as a field service engineer for Sperry Marine,
Corcoran was a 20-year Navy veteran who had retired as a lieutenant.
Corcoran was 46, leaving behind a wife and three sons.
Stadtmuller had graduated from Union College in Schenectady, N.Y.,
in 1958 with a bachelor's degree and had made a number of previous
trips aboard Thresher as a field engineer for Sperry Marine. Stadtmuller
was 26 years old when he died aboard the submarine.
"It is our honor to contribute to the memorial recognizing our employees and the dedicated crew of the Thresher," said Bill Hannon ,
vice president of Northrop Grumman Maritime Systems. "Their sacrifices
serve as a reminder that there will always be dangers inherent in the
vital work of maintaining global security."
Funded
by outside donors, the Thresher Memorial features a 129-foot flagpole
in a memorial courtyard with granite plaques from more than 250
contributors. The memorial is in Kittery, Maine, adjacent to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard where the Thresher was based.
The
Thresher was the first of only two nuclear-powered U.S. Navy submarines
to go down at sea. Its nuclear fuel remained intact and has never posed
any safety threat. A thorough inquiry into the likely cause of the
sinking led to design changes that made subsequent nuclear submarines
safer and more secure.
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